Whoa, Black Betty

I had the best personal training session of my life today. We started with the rowing machine for ten minutes and then moved on to squats - yes, good old-fashioned, keep-your-back-straight-if-you-don't-want-to-hurt-yourself squats. My form is fucking perfect. Finally. Three sets of six at seventy-some pounds with killer form. My ass has never looked better. Then, we moved on to bench press. Three sets of ten at my highest weight ever! I didn't even need help with spotting - I just powered through those like a killer. Thrilled with my progress.

Who's a neurotic, competitive little psycho? I'm a neurotic competitive little psycho.

After that, we finished the last 30 minutes with a totally functional workout. Jump squats, lunges, incline push-ups, jumping jacks, high-knee sprints, bounding, burpees, and mountain climbers. We finished off with three types of shoulder lifts and ended with abs and stretching. I burned close to 700 calories. It was glorious. I can barely walk up stairs and washing my hair was an absolute nightmare.

It's always a good feeling when you earn the right to be sore the next morning. Can't wait til I roll out of my bed groan. I'm back down to 137 today, post-workout. Listening to Black Betty by Spiderbait. Puts me in a good mood.

I'm not going back to therapy. Yeah, I keep flip-flopping, and I know I'll change my mind again in a month. But I'm not going until I've at least gotten down to 135. I'll strongly consider going back once Christmas break is over. Made up my mind.

So far, I've eaten fairly clean today. Had half a peanut butter & jelly sandwich this morning because I was in a rush (I have to wake up at 6am to make my training session on time). Had a romaine salad with black beans, mushrooms, and cheese. I also had whole-wheat pasta with low-sugar spaghetti sauce. Later I'm having tilapia and mixed vegetables. Still loading up on the tea. 10 days to go until December 11th, and I have to hit 135 before then! Wish me luck!

(P.S. - thanks to everyone who reads this blog - It feels great to know that I'm not alone, and that there really are people who understand everything this entails. You're amazing.)

I don't know what to do

The intensive outpatient treatment I was hoping to start in January will cost me $100 per week, even after insurance has covered 80% of that. And I absolutely cannot afford that. I'm already paying $10,000 per semester in tuition, and $500/month in rent. I can't even afford to drive my car more than twice a week, and I only spend $40/month on groceries. I cannot afford $400/month for four months of IOP. Not to mention that I'd have to drive for over an hour twice a week just to attend the individual and group therapy sessions.

I'm in between classes right now, hiding in my lab, trying not to cry. I think I need this. But I can't, I absolutely cannot afford that. I don't know what to do.

I'm back up to 138.2 this morning. I started taking niacin again, hoping it will have some kind of effect.

I have a question

I’m not so sure I had an eating disorder until people started telling me I did. Sure, I flirted with the idea. What I do isn’t normal, but I thought it bordered more on OCD. I’ve always been a perfectionist, and I’ve always prided myself on self control. But it didn’t necessarily revolve around food until I started dieting, and even then, I didn’t develop any real anxiety about it until people started commenting on my diet. Back in February, I was almost convinced it was an ED, but when I looked up the diagnostic criteria, I was too fat to have anorexia and I couldn’t have bulimia because I didn’t binge or purge. Right now, I vary somewhere between “eating disorder” and plain old “disordered eating.” Liam, my boyfriend, believes it’s an eating disorder, and he’s sure I’m just going to get worse and worse until I start treatment at the ED clinic. He predicts that it’ll develop into full blown anorexia.

I really, really don’t think that’s the case. I can’t stress enough that I have zero desire to be skinny. I want to be muscular and slim and sexy and have a fairly low body-fat percentage, and there is nothing sexy to me about weighing 97 pounds. That’s sickly. I want to be strong; I do not want my weight or body fat to dip so low as to put my health in jeopardy. My rigid control, inflexibility, and guilt are all hallmark characteristics of eating disordered behavior, but I simply don’t fit the category for a stereotypical eating disorder, and I hate “ED-NOS.” I hate my label. It doesn’t mean anything. There are so many different ways to categorize a person with an eating disorder, and I think the only thing we really have in common is that we are never, ever happy with our bodies; we are never happy with staying the same every day; and we either have too much control or not nearly enough.

Does that theme run in every aspect of your life? Your grades, your relationships? It does for me. Please, give me your thoughts, because I’m 22 and I’m still trying to figure it out. I want to know how the behaviors that led to your ED, or the ones caused by your ED, permeate the rest of who you are. Are you this obsessive/controlling/anxious about everything, or just food and exercise?

My blog title, “Like Machine Does It,” comes from how I’ve always thought about myself - mechanical. I function. I don’t like to think of myself as a person with totally basic boring awful wretched weak human needs. I wish I didn’t need so much. My friends think of me as a bit mechanical and cold and so straight forward, someone who always does what’s asked of her without complaining. I sleep, I work out, I eat clean, I get my shit done. But lately I feel entirely too much (lately being in the last year) and it’s scaring me. So, the machine is something I aspire to be like. And I behave this way because this is like machines behave - this is like machine does it. And machines don’t feel, and they’re perfect, and they’re never weak - they simply don’t exist to be weak. Food is just one of my ways of controlling that need, that thing that makes me a weak awful human.

God, sorry for that awful pseudo-poetic ramble.

Just...two...more...

137.2 this morning. That's, like, two pounds away from my original goal, the one I set way back in May of '10 when I weighed almost 190 pounds. I am so excited I could puke. So far today I've had a bowl of oatmeal (totally plain), tilapia, two cups of broccoli, and plain black coffee. Also a caffeine pill and a multivitamin. I ran for half an hour this morning, but I didn't push myself because my knee started whining again, and I don't want to risk re-straining it this close to my goal. My gym opens up again tomorrow, and I will be in there at 8am :)

I'm almost nervous. I get to start GRADUALLY working my way back up to a decent caloric amount after I reach my goal. I don't know what I'm going to do with an extra 500 calories a day. It's almost too much to think about. But that puts me so much closer to getting my body fat percentage crazy low, because my body won't act like I'm starving it any more. I'm excited, anxious, nervous...

I almost can't look forward to winter break yet because of all the grad school-related stuff I have to do, but December 11th is right around the corner, and then I'm home free for nearly one month. All my medium-sized clothing is hanging off of me, as are the size 8 jeans I just bought. Size 6, here I finally come!

138.2

Less than 700 calories yesterday. I weighed 138.2 this morning. That's two pounds in 24 hours. No, it's not healthy, but it feels fucking good. That's not something I'm okay with doing on a regular basis, but when you need to see that scale move, it's a way to get it done.

Less than three pounds left to my original goal. I look good in black leggings and a tight, small wife beater. Really, really good. Like, athlete good. No jelly rolls when I'm standing up, almost none when I'm sitting down either. A year and a half ago, I could not have picture myself like this.

Once I get down to 135, I'm just gonna focus on maintaining and changing my the make-up of my body. I want to stay at 135 pounds, but I want another 5-percent shift in my body fat. Right now I'm around 19%. I want to get to 14%. That means eating often, eating clean, and LIFTING WEIGHTS :D

I fucking love working out. It's so much easier than not eating.

Bonus: Added a new page of fitspiration pictures snagged from around the web - place for me to save all the photos of sexy girls with abs :)

Wretched

I was bad yesterday. I was so, so bad. One thousand six hundred eighty three calories worth of bad and vile and absolutely wretched. I almost started crying between dinner and dessert. The food was delicious, something out of Better Homes and Gardens. The company was fantastic. And I feel like a huge fucking cow.

And it's deceptive. A friend took a picture of me from after dinner, sitting on the floor holding a camera, and I look so tiny. I look like a happy, giggling little girl. I've never seen a picture of myself at this weight. I weighed 140.2 pounds again this morning. That picture doesn't make sense. I know it's because I had a cardigan on, hiding my arms, otherwise I would have looked like I always do. My arms are my second least favorite feature, after my stomach. But in that picture, I looked...petite. I've never been petite in my life. It's surreal.

I've been good today, better than I've ever been. Six hundred and forty six calories. I need penance after yesterday; I need to purifying my body. And it feels fantastic. I walked a lot, drank a lot of tea. I'm sorry for what I did yesterday. It was wrong. I know I'd reach 135 faster if I didn't do this to myself.

And then I tell myself, there is nothing wrong with eating 1600 calories in one day. That's perfectly fucking normal. But normally I don't go over 1200. So 1600 feels like a huge overeat. I know I'm wrong. But I can't stop feeling so insanely guilty. And the way I feel when I'm empty, it's like being holy. How can I give that up? I know it's wrong. I know it's a problem. And I'm trying, I really am. I don't like knowing that I behave illogically.

Thanksgiving f[e]ast

At 9:30am, I took 200mg of caffeine. At 11am, I had about two cubic inches of a homemade raspberry breakfast bar. At 12pm, I had 4 oz of baked chicken breast with 1 tbsp of barbecue sauce. I've also had a cup of green tea sweetened with truvia. It's around 1:30 now. I'm completely wired. I took the dogs for a walk this morning around the neighborhood. I'm almost too hyper to focus. I forgot that caffeine does this to me. Eventually my tolerance will build back up, but it's been almost a year since I've supplemented my diet with caffeine. I need to lose four pounds before December 11th (end of the semester; going home for almost a month). I was 139 this morning. There's no way in hell I'm gonna weigh 140 pounds tomorrow.

I'm gonna do something crazy and actually attempt to lose weight this Thanksgiving. I can try a little of whatever and just moderate the hell out of it. As we speak, I am baking two pecan pies that I will not be helping to consume. No alcohol either. It's poisonous and fat-making.

I really can't focus. Too much caffeine and too few calories. I have a paper to finish today before the festivities.

I am too much

That's the phrase that bounces around my head. "I am too much," "There is too much of me." I don't want to take up this much space in the universe. I know it sounds contradictory when I say I don't want to be skinny. I absolutely do not want to be skinny. I just want to be less fat. I want to be muscle and skin and bone, perfectly streamlined and smooth. More human, less animal. More machine and less human, maybe.

I'm sorry I'm getting poetic and off topic, but there you go.

I was on the phone with the second clinic this morning, and I think that's the one I'll go with. It's intensive outpatient therapy, which equates to weekly individual therapy, group therapy, and nutritional counseling. I won't be able to to start until January, as I won't be around during Christmas break.

And I'm absolutely horrified that they'll take one look at me and think (just like I think) "She's too fat to have an eating disorder." So, I keep thinking that I'll have to lose at least ten more pounds by January 4th, so that I'm worthy of treatment. And I know those thoughts are FALSE and delusional.

I am worthy of help and health.

But I don't believe that I'm worthy of treatment because I haven't earned it. And that's a fucking sick way of thinking about it. Just the fact that I have thoughts like that should be enough to tell me that I'm sick and I need help. But I can't see it.

Strain

The Good news: I took a 200mg caffeine pill this morning. I react to that stuff like it's speed. I read three scholarly articles in twenty minutes and went for a 5k run (29 minutes). Normally I'm not even functioning high enough to brush my teeth before 9am. I think this will be my new regular morning routine (at least on weekdays; I have to switch it up constantly so my body doesn't find a rhythm).

The Bad news: I seriously messed up my left knee this time. I knew half-way through my run that I was straining it, but like an idiot I kept going for another mile and a half. Now, a few hours later, it feels fine when I'm not putting pressure on it, but when I put pressure on it it's pretty unbearable. I'm gonna give it a few days to heal, which means no cardio for me until after Thanksgiving. That's what I get for being an overachiever.

On a completely random note, one of the journalism students from my university just contacted me via my bodybuilding.com profile, wanted to do a story on my extreme weight loss, healthy lifestyle, and fitness goals for the school newspaper, because I've made such progress in such a short time. That's an odd feeling. I told him I'd be willing to do it if it were just a story, not a video clip, and if there were other people featured as well. This offer is coming on the heels of my therapist wanting me to get treatment at an eating disorders clinic.

I can't make this shit up, people.

Hungry

From October 2010 through February of 2011, I liked being hungry. Especially at night. It was a signal that I'd done something right, and that I was safe. Then, over this past summer, I started seeing hunger as a negative trigger, meaning that my body was in starvation mode and that it was already too late and my muscles were being eaten away, or something like that. So, I started to panic whenever I was marginally hungry, but I'd also freak out whenever I felt full.

Right now I'm trying to find the middle ground. I had my second therapy session this morning. It was more of an intake assessment than anything. The doctor referred me to a specialized clinic for eating disorders and disordered eating. Yeah, there's a difference. Apparently I'm on the cusp between the two. I don't want to go to a clinic. Not to mention it'll probably cost even more. But more that I'm afraid of the label. I don't want to go to an EATING DISORDERS CLINIC. That's like putting a big red stamp on my forehead. The label makes me feel even weaker, like I've "really done it this time."

And right now, I'm hungry. I'm so, so very hungry.

I've started adding a lot of tea back into my diet, hoping the caffeine will push me off this plateau. I was 139.8 this morning, which might as well be 140.

On the plus side, I had a fantastic workout this evening. I hit arms, mostly biceps and chest. I feel self conscious about my arms because my triceps are overdeveloped compared to my biceps. My arms are actually considerable bigger than they out to be, proportionally, because I concentrate a lot on my shoulders and upper arms when lifting. I'm not going for a stereotypical hourglass shape, more like two triangles. I want my upper body to look like an inverted triangle. I've come to terms with the fact that after I'm done losing as much fat as I'd like, I'll more resemble a gymnast than a ballerina. I have a lot of muscle. Yes, I'm relatively flat-chested, another thing I'm coming to terms with after losing so much weight. I went from a 36DD to a 34A. My breasts are more pectoral muscle than breast (and I'm totally fine with that; running is comfortable now).

I also did a hard half hour of cardio on the elliptical (hard meaning that I didn't just pedal and fiddle with the television.) If I'm not sweating hard half way through, I'm doing something wrong. I got to add 300 calories onto my total for the day! Not that I'll get to eat them. New rule, no eating after 8pm. Hopefully I actually see some movement on the scale tomorrow!

Caffeine

I've come to the conclusion (it didn't take much thought) that I'm seriously missing caffeine in my life. After I moved to my own apartment I lost my delightful coffee machine, so I've been nearly caffeine free for almost a month. Considering how much caffeine I used to consume, I have good grounds to assume that a lack thereof is directly affecting my metabolism.

I was 140 again this morning. I just don't understand how I can still be that huge. I fit into a size six. Who fits into a size six at 140 pounds? And this is when I convince myself that the numbers on the clothes must be wrong. There's no way I can be smaller than a size twelve. I have a 28 inch waist, for chrissake. I don't even feel like a human being.

For breakfast, I had oatmeal with blackberries and stevia. Lunch was tilapia and a romaine salad, with black beans and cheese. I also had ground beef with salsa and chips. I don't know what I'll have for dinner, probably chicken breast and broccoli. Before I bunker down to study for the night, I'm going to make a rare grocery visit for caffeine pills, or green tea supplements. This will be the first time I've tried them. I'm going to try and keep my diet consistent enough to where I can tell if they're even making a significant difference. I also want to get back on niacin, but it's still too hot here, and I'm afraid I'd overheat. I'll wait until the winter break to start cycling again.

Do you ever just feel like a lump of flesh?

On a completely different topic, I can't tell you how much I love "fat people shows". Either documentaries about eating disorders, episodes of the biggest loser, obesity documentaries, weight loss shows, that sort of thing. I'm obsessed. I'm so thrilled What's Eating You finally has a few episodes on youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vx3n68PujqI&feature=channel_video_title

11-19-11

I'm doing really well so far today, as far as eating goes. I had old fashioned oatmeal and blackberries for breakfast, baked tilapia and a romaine salad for lunch. I did half an hour of cardio on the elliptical, and lifted legs (it was a light lifting day, low weight with more reps). While on the elliptical, I watched Man versus Food, which is one of my favorite shows. After my workout, I showered and had a protein shake (half a cup of skim milk with 26 grams of chocolate protein powder) and a cup of leftover pasta. It feels like too much, honestly. My stomach feels heavy. I still have 677 calories left for the day, which is exciting. That's like a real meal. I could eat a burger! I'm not going to eat a burger, because I care about my arteries, but I could, and I think that's nice.

I've consistently eaten under my limit every day this week, but again, I haven't lost any weight at all. I weighed 140 this morning, again, for some stupid reason. I'm sure it's because my body is retaliating at this point. I ate hardly anything at all yesterday, bits of a blueberry muffin, 20 ounces of gatorade, and a cup of leftover Chinese (I'm a grad student; I have a lot of leftovers).

Devastatingly, my gym will be closed from November 24th through the 27th, for the Thanksgiving break. So not only do they throw food at me, but they cut me off from my personal fitness sanctuary as well. I'll be running a lot more on those days. My goal for the next week is to at least maintain. I don't know what would happen if I broke 140. I can't even picture anything higher on the scale.

On the plus side, my clothes keep fitting me better and better. I know the major reason I'm not losing weight is because I put on muscle so fast. My entire family has that in common. I may not weigh 120 pounds, but I can bench press more than most girls I know, and I still fit into a small. My next goal in life, if this whole grad school thing doesn't work out, is to pursue figure modeling and personal training. I would love that. Constant form. Constant numbers. Everything calculated and scheduled and just so. To think I could actually make a career out of perfecting my form. It's a pipe dream.

Running

I woke up late this morning, too late to make it into the gym, so I went for my first real run in months. It takes me a while to prepare for a run. I pull my hair up. I wear the clothes I wore whenever the last time I worked out was. No point in making new ones dirty. I tie my shoes. I wait until at least half an hour after I've eaten something. I stretch. I put on my heart rate monitor and watch. I make sure my mp3 player is sitting just right against my hip. I make sure the monitor is working. The whole process usually takes at least fifteen minutes. I make sure my shoes are tied right. They're not. I re-tie them.

My run lasted half an hour (29 minutes and 58 seconds) and went from my apartment, down two blocks, and wrapped around the front of my campus. I raced myself back to make sure I made it in under half an hour. I burned 359 calories. It was hot outside. I don't think about anything while I run. I just listen to music and my legs move and I can look down and see my muscles flexing and everything is better.

I am choosing to continue with therapy. My next appointment is Monday morning.

This morning I ate oatmeal. Lunch was leftover Chinese. Then, for some stupid reason, I had a vegan burrito. But I didn't have the donuts brought for my lab. For dinner I'm going to have tuna salad and one ounce of cheddar cheese. We're all going out tonight for drinks. I'm not drinking. This morning, I weighed 139.2.

I messed up my knee on my run. I'm not going to run tomorrow. Just use the elliptical, I think. Saturday will be an off-day, then. I never workout for more than three days in a row, and I never do more than half an hour of cardio at a time. I wish I could, but then I'd never stop, and I have to have limits. Because my body is fallible.

Fear

I don't want to keep going to therapy. I realized that this afternoon. I'm afraid (illogically, delusionally) that if I get better, I'll gain weight. And I'll get so fat again. I terrified of even gaining back five pounds. But I've convinced myself that if this goes away, I'll turn back into the terrible obese monster I used to be. I am absolutely mortified.

I talked it all over with my boyfriend. He thinks it's ludicrous to stop going, or to avoid it. He only wants me to get better. My family would say the same thing. I also talked to one of my friends in the program. She agrees. I'm going to keep going. But I'm just so scared.

This is all I have. I feel like this is all I have. This is what keeps me grounded. I don't know how to go for a day without counting calories. Because mystically, that constant worry is what keeps me from getting fat. That's the only control I have.

And writing that out, I know how insanely delusional it sounds. I know it's crazy talk. It's not real. Normal people don't count calories, don't exercise obsessively, and they don't blow up. There's nothing magical about it. I just can't quite make myself believe it.

First post

I weighed 140 pounds this morning. Well, 140.2 That puts my BMI at 23.3, because I'm 5'5". I woke up at 6am, ate a bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch, and went to my personal training session. It was a functional workout. I ran stairs, did push-ups, lots of abs, worked with kettle bells and medicine balls. I even fell backwards off the stairs doing toe touches. I finished my workout fifteen minutes ahead of schedule. That's what you get when you don't take breaks. My body-fat percentage is 19.4. That's down from six weeks ago, when it was right around 25%. It's amazing the things you can do in just six weeks. Imagine what I'll be able to accomplish by the end of May.

On the bus on the way there and back, I read Marya Hornbacher's Wasted. I ordered it weeks ago. It just got here. This is my second time reading it.

For lunch, I had leftover pasta. And varied throughout the day, broccoli, a cheese stick, homemade vegetable soup, a chicken breast, and a romaine salad with cheese, black beans, and dressing. For dinner I'm going to have tilapia. And something else. That almost puts me over on sodium for the day. I'm trying to stay under on everything. I can have 1380 calories. More today, because I worked out.

My name is Rachel. I am 22 years old, I am a grad student, and I have an eating disorder. When I'm not writing papers or working on research, I'm obsessing over food and exercise. To be most specific, I have ED-NOS. That's an eating disorder, not otherwise specified. I'm not anorexic or bulimic, I don't purge after I eat, and I'm not underweight. What I do is count. Everything. I have panic attacks if I don't know what is in my food, if I don't know where it came from, if I can't determine its exact nutritional content. I weigh all my food and plan my meals weeks ahead of time. If I deviate from this, I feel deep overwhelming guilt. I can't function. I feel deep and constant shame when I do eat, no matter what it is. I don't exercise as a purging behavior, but because it helps curb some of the guilt. And it helps push away the unbearable thoughts of "fatness." I realize that my body is healthy, that I am not overweight. But part of the problem is false cognition and misperception. I'm ashamed of my body, and to me, needing to eat reflects a permeating physical weakness. I have a lot of issues with personal weakness, and perceiving myself as weak, or worth less, because of my body, or my needs. This overlying theme permeates most realms of my life.

I used to weigh 190 pounds. That was a year ago.

I'm writing all this because I want to talk to someone about it and hopefully find other people who understand. As a disclaimer, I want to say now that I don't think this behavior is okay, and I encourage anyone with an eating disorder, no matter how more or less severe than mine, to seek treatment.

I myself am in treatment. My therapist, my clinician, and my friends and family are all aware of what I go through. I talk to people. Just like I'm talking now. I am not, however, in recovery. I am trying to modify my current behaviors to make them into something healthy. I'm trying to turn my obsessions and compulsions and anxiety and guilt into something good. I'm trying to find reasons to change. I've been like this for so long that I can't remember what it's like to not think about what I eat.

Worst case scenario, you'll find what I write to be horrible, or boring, or shallow. I hope not, because I have a very thin skin, and I'm only here to do something good. Either to make myself feel better, or to help someone else. Maybe I'm that naive.